We walked in silence for a while. Not the heavy kind—just the sort that hangs between strangers who haven't quite figured out how to be anything else yet.
The forest was starting to change. The light had shifted—subtle, but enough to notice. Shadows stretched longer than they should've. Trees leaned in just a little too close. The usual songs of birds and insects had vanished, like the forest itself was holding its breath.
Beside me, Cinderella limped along, barefoot now. I offered her one of my extra socks from the basket, and she took it with a quiet thanks. It wasn't much, but it kept the rocks from cutting her feet open.
"So," I said after a while, "Cinderella."
"Yes?"
"That your real name, or did someone call you that because of all the ash?"
She looked at me, startled. Then she smiled—a sad little thing. "That obvious, huh?"
I gave her a look.
She sighed. "My real name's Ella. But they started calling me 'Cinderella' after they made me clean out the fireplaces. Day after day. Soot in my hair, under my nails. You know how it goes."
"I don't," I said. "But I believe you."
She looked surprised at that. "Most people just tell me to stop complaining."
"Most people," I said, "don't listen."
We walked a few more steps in silence. A breeze curled between the trees, warm and oddly sweet, like overripe fruit.
She hesitated. Then, "My stepmother isn't cruel in the way people expect. She's precise. Calculated. She never hits. Never yells. She just… slices you with words. Cold ones. Tiny ones. So you can't even prove she's doing it."
I glanced at her. "What about your stepsisters?"
"They're worse," she said flatly. "Always laughing. Always reminding me that I don't belong to the family. That I was a mistake my father left behind when he died."
She said it without blinking, without emotion. Like it had become a script she was too tired to rewrite.
I didn't press her.
Instead, I offered, "My grandmother raised me. My parents… well, that's a longer story. Not worth telling."
She looked over. "That's fair."
I nodded. "But I know what it's like. Being made to feel like you're the extra part. The one the story didn't plan for."
Her lips curled. "That's exactly it."
We rounded a bend in the path, and that's when I saw it.
The clearing.
It was small—just wide enough to catch the light that filtered through the trees like a soft spotlight. In the center sat three women around a bubbling cauldron. Not your typical kind of women, either. One wore a patchwork robe stitched together from buttons and thread. Another had pins sticking out of her hair like a pincushion. The third wore a shawl made of smoke—literally. It curled and shimmered like it wasn't entirely attached to this world.
Cinderella stopped. "What… are they?"
"Witches," I said. "Obviously."
She gave me a look. "Witches are real?"
"You're going to a royal ball in a pumpkin cart. You think this is the unbelievable part?"
She opened her mouth, then closed it again.
The witch with the smoke shawl turned toward us. "You're late," she said, without any hint of surprise.
I stepped forward. "We didn't know we had an appointment."
"Everyone has an appointment," said the one with pins in her hair. "They just don't know when it is."
Cinderella looked at me, unsure.
The third witch stood up and walked over to her, examining her like she was a piece of fabric. "Mmm. Thin. Worn. But you'll do."
"Excuse me?" Cinderella said.
"Glass," the smoke witch murmured. "She'll need glass. And magic. And a lie sharp enough to pass for truth."
"I'm not lying," Cinderella said.
"Oh, darling," the pinned witch said with a smile. "Of course you are. You're pretending you're the kind of girl who gets a happy ending."
There was a silence after that. Heavy. Humid. A little cruel.
Cinderella's chin lifted. "And what if I want to be?"
The witches shared a glance.
And then, in a flurry of motion, they descended. Threads spun into the air, colors stitched from starlight, shoes formed from the breath of glass. A pumpkin behind us groaned and split open, vines twisting until they snapped into the shape of a grand carriage.
Cinderella blinked. Her dress had changed—dark navy blue, with tiny silver stars sewn into the hem. Her hair had curled itself into soft waves. Her face shimmered faintly, like it had been brushed with moonlight.
I looked down and realized I'd changed too.
My cloak was deeper—crimson like wet paint. My boots were high, polished, laced with silver. My dress beneath shimmered with scarlet threads I hadn't seen before.
"Why me?" I asked the smoke witch quietly.
"You're not the one who needs help," she said. "But you're the one who asks questions."
And then the carriage door creaked open.
"Be back by midnight," the pinned witch said. "That's not a spell thing. It's just when the food goes bad."
We climbed in.
The horses neighed. The wind shifted.
And the forest behind us vanished into shadow.